Friday, December 30, 2016

I have an old, really beat up quilt for my grandmother. It has holes every where and there is no way it could be saved. Well, one day a few months ago, my local quilt shop sent out an email about this...

It mentioned something about turning old quilts into something new. What a great idea! So I made this for my sister for Christmas. I didn't give her any explanation, but she knew right away what it was and where it came from. And she loved it!

(I have plans for another one for someone else who I know would really like it! And if there is enough quilt left, I might do one for me too!)

Earlier this year we repainted the kids room so decided that they needed quilts to go with their "new" room. So I drew up two patterns, found a color scheme that went with their room and their favorite colors.

So first I started with Naomi's quilt. I started last spring when I could work on it when she was in school.

Her quilt was very random. I started by throwing out the squares and made sure they were mixed up real good.

Then straightened them up.

Then sewed them together with the sashing.

Then quilted it. I kept it simple with straight lines.

She loved it.

For Alana's I had a hard time deciding with way the pattern should go. This one has three different squares. Pretty simple.

This one has 5 separate blocks. it takes more planning, but is funner to look at. My husband voted for the second one.

So, after bed time during the summer, and after she started Kindergarten, I sewed it all together.

See, its fun to look at!

I got it pinned together...

And quilted it with a bunch of diagonal lines.

She loved it too!

I love how they are different enough that when they grow out of liking to be the same, they can be different, but yet, they still work together with each other and the color scheme in the room. As you can tell, Noami's favorite color is pink, and Alana's is teal blue. They also picked out the colors for the room. I was really surprised when Naomi picked yellow fro her wall color

Monday, December 19, 2016

I was contacted by a friend of a friend to make this shirt quilt for a daughter who is a sports star!

I started out by rough cutting each shirt, ironing on stabilizer on the back, then cutting them to size. Each square is 12.5 inches across, but they all vary in length, depending on the design on the shirt.

Then I pieced them all together, starting in vertical strips, centering them together, adding filler blocks, piecing the strips together, and adding a border to bring it to size.

Then I layered on the batting a back fabric that the mom picked out. Then i quilted it like crazy. I used my favorite design or a meandering swirly line. It creates a lot of movement, is easy to fill areas, and I can start and stop easily and hide it easily.

Then I added a coordinating hem.

I love the way it turned out. And the mom loves it too. She is giving it to her daughter for Christmas!